Episode Details

Psalm 4: The Gladness That Outlasts the Harvest

There is a moment in this psalm that slips by so quickly one can easily miss its strangeness. The world around the psalmist is groaning its old familiar complaint — "Who will shew us any good?" — that low, perpetual murmur of people who have decided happiness is a rumor. And the psalmist's answer is not to argue, not to defend God's goodness, not even to list his blessings. He simply says: "Thou hast put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that their corn and their wine increased." It is one of the quietest boasts in Scripture. He is not saying his barn is fuller than theirs; he is saying his gladness is of a different kind altogether — the kind that does not depend on the harvest. And then, as if to prove it, he lies down. "I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep." Safety, in the end, is not the absence of trouble but the presence of the One who makes you dwell. The corn and the wine come and go. The gladness stays.

00:00 Hear Me When I Call
00:18 Commune With Your Own Heart Upon Your Bed
00:35 Gladness More Than Corn and Wine
00:52 Lay Me Down in Peace